


9 to 5

by cherryvanilla



Series: Yuletide Assignments and Treats [12]
Category: Social Network (2010) RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Office, Co-workers, First Dates, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-01
Updated: 2016-01-01
Packaged: 2018-05-05 22:48:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,779
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5393132
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherryvanilla/pseuds/cherryvanilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Andrew comes into work whistling. At 8:45 in the morning. <i>Whistling</i>. </p><p>“Good morning, Jesse!” he says as he takes off his messenger bag, smiling sunnily at Jesse before ducking into his cubicle. </p><p>“What Disney film did you step out of,” Jesse mutters to himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	9 to 5

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bitnotgood](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitnotgood/gifts).



> Based on this tumblr prompt: "You’re one of those annoying people who tries to make casual conversation all the time and brings people baked goods and stuff and I just want to mind my own business but somehow we end up being friends or something?? AU"

Jesse loves that his job has cubicles so he can just sit there, do his writing, and not have to really interact with anyone at all. That is, until he gets a new co-worker named Andrew who doesn’t know the definition of personal space or what cubicles actually exist for. 

Jesse would care more if he wasn’t also ridiculously attractive. 

(He’s well aware of his superficiality in this matter.)

“Maybe it’s a British thing,” Jesse says that night in his apartment to Clifford and Tennessee. “The stupid attractiveness, that is.” 

They ignore him. 

“Traitors,” Jesse says to his cats. 

They get up and leave the room.  
_________________________

Andrew comes into work whistling. At 8:45 in the morning. _Whistling_. 

“Good morning, Jesse!” he says as he takes off his messenger bag, smiling sunnily at Jesse before ducking into his cubicle. 

“What Disney film did you step out of,” Jesse mutters to himself. 

“What was that?” Andrew asks as he pops up over the side of the cubicle wall he shares with Jesse. 

Jesse gasps in surprise and nearly falls out of his chair. 

“Shoot, I’m sorry,” Andrew’s saying, his bushy eyebrows creasing in worry. 

Jesse steadies his chair, clearing his throat. “It’s fine. Um. And I didn’t say anything,” he lies, darting his eyes up to Andrew. 

Andrew smiles at him like he doesn’t believe him. “Alright, Jesse,” he says cheerfully. 

He slinks back down his side of the wall, and the top of his hair the last thing Jesse sees disappear. He kind of hates that he finds himself missing Andrew already. 

He gets himself together, takes a sip of his orange soda and opens up his Word document. It was grant writing time.

That’s what he’s here for, after all. Not to make friends.  
_________________________  
At 11am, Andrew knocks on his cubicle wall, right above where his New York Nets patch hangs. 

It’s such a ridiculous gesture, the knock, but Jesse’s heart jumps a little at it. 

“You seem to be in the zone, so I thought I’d bring you a snack,” Andrew says, smiling. He holds out his hand and with it a package of Famous Amos cookies from the vending machine. 

“Who are you?” Jesse blurts and then blinks at himself, much like Andrew is now blinking at him. 

Andrew runs a hand through his stupid ( _stupid_ ) hair and laughs a little nervously. “Um, I’m Andrew Garfield, I transferred here from the London office, we’ve been working next to each other for a few weeks now.” 

“I know that,” Jesse says impatiently. “I was being rhetorical.” 

“And I was making fun of you,” Andrew replies happily. 

“Oh,” Jesse replies, frowning. “Well.” He takes the proffered cookies. “Um, thank you.” 

“You’re welcome,” Andrew nods. 

Jesse first thinks he misses the days when no one bothered him. 

He then thinks he should probably not lie to himself, because that seems masochistic.  
________________________________

Andrew starts interrupting every Monday through Friday, promptly at 11a.m. and giving Jesse baked goods. If it isn’t cookies, then it’s a honey bun or powdered donuts or a mini apple pie. 

While doing so he manages to always look disapprovingly at Jesse’s orange soda, as if bringing all this sugary goodness is somehow better than Jesse starting his morning with soda. 

Andrew starts bringing him a bottle of water by Wednesday. 

Jesse raises an eyebrow at him. 

“Important to stay hydrated,” he says, sheepishly. 

Jesse thinks about it the rest of the week, and his stupid smile when he said that. Come Monday, he’s made a decision, having agonized over it all weekend and even having a slight anxiety attack because of it. 

He looks at the time on his computer. 10:59. 

He watches it change to 11:00a.m., hears the tell-tale knock. 

He’s greeted to Andrew’s sunny smile and gulps. 

“So, you’re spending all your hard earned money feeding me, the least I can do is return the favor.” 

Jesse says the words in such a rush and he’s unsure if they were intelligible. From the way Andrew was gaping at him it was entirely impossible they hadn’t been. 

Until Andrew’s face cracks open into that ridiculously sunny, sweet grin that makes Jesse think he’s stepped into animation and there should be hearts flying in the air or something. 

“Yeah?” Andrew says. 

Jesse taps his fingers on his leg. “Yeah, uh. I’ll buy you lunch today.” 

“That sounds great, Jesse.” 

Jesse nods. “Okay, um. 1pm? That’s usually when you -- go, isn’t it?”

Jesse doesn’t eat lunch in the kitchen with the others, or out. He brings his lunch, the same thing every day, and eats it at his desk, never taking the full hour he’s allotted. 

“Have a good lunch, Jesse,” is what Andrew has said to him around 1pm each day, waving as he walks down the hall, after the first day they met in which he asked Jesse what people did around here for food and Jesse had replied, “I don’t know, I do my own thing.” 

Thinking back on it now, and the way Andrew’s eyes had dimmed a little, it’s very possible Andrew had been hedging, trying to ask Jesse for lunch.  
Jesse wasn’t good at reading other people’s hedging; he was usually the one doing it himself. 

“Yes, that’s when I go,” Andrew was saying now, with a laugh in his voice like he was in on a joke Jesse wasn’t privy to. 

“Okay, cool,” Jesse replies, rubbing his palms on his pants and spinning around in his chair and back to his work. He really needed some breathing space. This was a little too much. 

“See you then,” Andrew says quietly and Jesse gives him a small, distracted wave, not looking back. 

He was probably rude just then, but it was necessary. Andrew made him nervous for reasons he was trying not to think about. 

He spends the next two hours barely able to form any rational thought, constantly staring at the time and listening to Andrew click click away next to him.  
_This is why I keep to myself_ , he thinks. He should abort, call the whole thing off. 

He’s getting ready to do just that except it’s one, and Andrew’s standing in front of him, smile firmly in place, practically vibrating with energy.  
Jesse has no place to go but out the door with him.  
______________________________

Andrew suggests the deli just up the block, which is fine by Jesse. He orders cheeseburger and fries from the grill section while Andrew gets some healthy looking wrap. 

“I’m totally stealing some of your fries,” Andrew says while they’re in line to pay. 

“Don’t you call them chips or something?” 

Andrew laughs and goes into a minutes-long explanation of fries and chips and crisps while they’re waiting to pay. By the end of it, Jesse knows more about varying forms of potato than he ever really needed to. 

But he also finds he likes listening to Andrew talk. And he doesn’t like listening to many people talk, so he again blames it all on the accent.  
Which, if he admits to himself, is hot. 

They walk up the stairs to the seating area and Andrew happily chatters on about London and what he misses the most about it. Jesse learns he was actually born in California and moved to Surrey when he was three years old. 

He’s losing himself in just listening to Andrew when he finally stops and says, “So tell me about yourself, then.” 

Jesse opens his mouth, closes it, opens it again. 

“I, uh. Okay?” 

No one really -- asks him that. The friends he has are ones he’s had since high school, so it’s not like he really needs to re-introduce himself to people. He isn’t friends with any of his co-workers and prefers it that way, and he hasn’t had a relationship in a few years. 

This feels too much like a job interview and he hasn’t had one of _those_ in like 6 years either. 

Jesse takes a deep breath and tries to follow the path Andrew set, mimicking talking about his childhood, where he was born, his family, his schooling. By the end of it, he’s gotten into a groove, talking animatedly with his hands. It feels good, especially since every time Jesse actually catches Andrew’s eye it’s to find him smiling wide at him with this soft look in his eye that Jesse has no idea what to do with. 

They make it back to the office on time and Jesse feels -- happy. Andrew leaves him at his desk with a shy smile and a, “Thanks again for lunch,” and then he hears him whistling intermittently throughout the rest of the afternoon through their shared cubicle wall. 

Normally, that would drive Jesse insane.

Instead, he finds himself wanting to whistle right along. 

He doesn’t, but it’s a near thing.  
____________________________

The rest of the week Jesse conveniently “forgets” his lunch. 

He and Andrew go out together every day. 

Andrew keeps buying Jesse snacks, so Jesse in turn buys Andrew the dessert of his choice at the deli. 

By the end of the week Jesse finds himself wishing the weekend were already over and that it were Monday again already. 

So he’s surprised when Andrew stops by his desk at 5pm, instead of just waving his usual goodbye. 

“Hey,” he says and Jesse chews his lip, looking up at him. 

“Hey.” 

Andrew’s eyes drop to his mouth and Jesse feels self-conscious for a moment and then hot all over when Andrew seems to -- blush? 

He’s so fucking out of his league here. 

“Um. I was wondering if -- well. If you’d like to see a film this weekend?” 

“Oh, uh,” Jesse replies, blinking rapidly. “I don’t really -- watch films.”

“Oh,” Andrew says and he looks like a kicked puppy, it’s fucking ridiculous. _He’s_ fucking ridiculous. 

“Sorry,” Jesse says. 

Andrew nods, looking away and then back at Jesse again, smiling. It doesn’t meet his eyes, though. “Well. Have a good weekend, Jesse.” 

Jesse flashes back to that first day they met, to Andrew asking but not asking Jesse out to lunch. 

“Hey, um. But I do -- other things. We can do other things.” 

Andrew stops in his tracks, looks at Jesse, smile now tentative and hopeful. “Yeah?” 

Jesse nods rapidly. “Yeah, um. Do you like, um, books? I can take you to my favorite book store? Or is that -- that’s fucking boring, right?” 

Andrew laughs, leaning his side into the corner of the cubicle. “No, that’s. That’s perfect.” 

Jesse’s heart does that stupid fucking thing again and this is bad, this is so bad. Workplace -- relations -- aren’t exactly forbidden but Jesse always had a pretty firm rule of not mixing business and pleasure. 

Looking at Andrew’s face right now he just -- wants to give him all the pleasure. 

And now his face is totally hot, so that’s great. 

“Okay, so I guess give me your number,” Jesse says and then they’re both fumbling out their phones and entering them in. 

“I’ll text you where,” Jesse says. 

“Great!” Andrew’s doing that stupid big smiling thing again and the thing is, Jesse’s smiling right back.  
________________________________

They meet at the Drama Book Shop at 3pm, Jesse on his bike and Andrew just waiting outside. 

Andrew waves at him as he approaches and Jesse nearly crashes into a parked car. 

“I love that you ride a bike, one day I’d like to do that here.” 

Jesse shrugs, taking off his helmet and going to chain up his bike. “You get used to it.” 

Andrew looks -- good. Jesse’s never seen him out of work clothes but this Andrew is in jeans and a button up flannel and Jesse really likes that look.  
Jesse’s in jeans and and t-shirt, himself. Nothing fancy. He didn’t want to overthink this shit. 

He takes Andrew inside, shows him the different sections. Jesse parks himself in the plays area, but there’s all sorts of things, from anthologies to movies and TV to general theater and criticism. 

He kind of loses track of Andrew, because that’s just how he gets in bookstores. Andrew finds him while he’s knee deep in the contemporary modern theater section, checking out a new play he’d heard about. 

“I like this place,” Andrew murmurs and oh, he’s really close to Jesse. 

Jesse turns his head and swallows, staring up at Andrew into those big, warm eyes. 

“Yeah?” 

Andrew nods, smiling softly. “You like it, so.” 

Jesse licks his suddenly too dry lips, darts his eyes downward. “Yeah, uh. I’ve always been really into reading. When I was like, 13 I would be holed up in the corner of the library and my mom would have to come and drag me home, meanwhile all my friends were off playing sports after school.” Jesse laughs self-deprecatingly, shaking his head, thinking of his unruly hair and even unrulier acne. “You should’ve seen me.” 

“I really wish I had,” Andrew says, voice low, almost wondrous. 

Jesse’s pulse flutters and he looks up, takes in Andrew’s -- everything. 

“Uh,” Jesse says. 

“Can I--” Andrew starts, and then cuts himself off, eyes on Jesse’s lips again. 

Jesse finds himself nodding, holding his breath, and then Andrew’s leaning down and pressing their lips together softly, chaste. 

_I’m kissing my co-worker in my favorite book shop_ Jesse has the brainpower to think, and then he can’t think at all, because Andrew’s making the hottest, sweetest broken moan he’s ever heard and kissing Jesse harder, his hand coming to rest on Jesse’s shoulder, squeezing rhythmically. 

Jesse presses up, fitting their mouths together more firmly, letting his tongue inch out just barely. 

Andrew gasps and pulls back, looking down at Jesse like he’s seeing him for the first time. 

“Can I take you -- um, to dinner or -- wherever you want to go?” 

“Yeah,” Jesse says, not even recognizing his own voice. “Uh. Whatever you want.” 

He feels like he’s in a daze and Andrew _looks_ the same way, and he’s grinning down at Jesse like he’s just been given the best gift ever.  
It’s disconcerting and exhilarating all at once.  
_________________________________  
They go to dinner and Andrew smiles goofily at him the entire time. Jesse’s also pretty sure they’re playing footsie and he doesn’t play footsie with _anyone_ , much less in public. He’s not exactly sure who this person is who’s replaced him in his own body, but with Andrew looking at him like he’s the greatest thing since sliced bread, he can’t exactly complain about it. 

The conversation flows easily, despite the two of them acting like horny teenagers and staring at one another’s mouths like that’s the real meal here.  
Andrew thinks Jesse is hilarious and Jesse thinks Andrew is possibly the most precious thing in this world, and by the time dinner ends it’s possible Jesse’s a little in love. Or at least like. 

Jesse still has his bike but Andrew took the subway. They walk to the nearest stop and Jesse kind of wants to invite himself over, or invite Andrew to his place. But they work together and they should probably take this at least somewhat slow. 

Hell, Jesse might regret all of this in the morning. 

(No, he won’t.) 

They stand at the entrance to the subway and Andrew bends down again. This time Jesse’s completely ready for him, drags him in by one hand behind his neck and gives it everything he has. 

Andrew gasps into his mouth but doesn’t pull away this time, just parts his lips and drags his tongue along Jesse’s. They kiss deep and wet and slow, Jesse’s fingers curling in the back of Andrew’s neck and Andrew’s hands firmly around Jesse’s waist. They kiss until Jesse forgets that there are other things to do in life besides kissing. They kiss until Andrew pulls back and breathlessly says, “If we don’t stop, I may never leave this street corner.” 

“It’s not a bad neighborhood to live,” Jesse replies, and reels him in again, Andrew’s laughter vibrating against his lips. 

_________________________________

They eventually leave. 

Jesse thinks about him all weekend, and is glad when Andrew’s the first to text so he doesn’t have to. 

When he gets to work Monday morning there is a bag of Famous Amos, a bottle of water, and a post-it note on his keyboard that says _I’ll be needing copy paper around 11 a.m., I think you need some too, yes?_

Jesse smiles hard, can’t believe he’s thinking about making out in the supply closet at work. 

He can hear Andrew whistling from his cubicle. 

Jesse puts his hand up on their shared wall, fingers splayed, and joins in. 

The End.


End file.
